In those heady, sunny days of training camp, the Chiefs were going to be one of the league’s best young teams. And the Raiders were set to emerge from the Al Davis era with a new way of doing things, a new lease on playoff life.

Both may eventually come true, likely just not this time around. A quarter of the way into what will become of the 2012 season and the AFC West “race” has the look of a two-team affair.

So, after rolling the video as well as reaching out to scouts and personnel executives around the league, here’s a look at the AFC West:

KANSAS CITY CHIEFS

The lowdown: Chiefs coach Romeo Crennel has been around the NFL long enough to know his team is on the wrong side of football mathematics.

The Chiefs are last in the league in turnovers with 15, one of only three teams with more than nine over the season’s first four weeks. They are also last in turnover margin at minus-13.

The next worst teams — Carolina and Tennessee — are well above the basement at minus-6.

And unfortunately for Matt Cassel — the guy who was booed at a charity softball game this past summer — he has been responsible for 10 of those turnovers. Cassel has been intercepted seven times, has lost three fumbles, and may soon lose his job as Brady Quinn is up and throwing in the bullpen if Cassel’s miscues don’t stop.

And in the wake of those 15 turnovers, opponents have scored seven touchdowns and three field goals. Any offense, let alone one that hasn’t enjoyed the luxury of consistency, can’t survive those kinds of totals.

Cassel, who was general manager Scott Pioli’s first major acquisition in free agency on the job, will take plenty of the heat for it all, at least publicly. A player whose work ethic has never been questioned now finds himself the target of significant fan frustration, so much so Pioli and Crennel now find themselves squarely in the crosshairs of public opinion.

The reality is many personnel people around the league couldn’t understand why the Chiefs were the preseason darling of so many. Football people saw a thin depth chart overall, a No. 1 back coming off ACL surgery in Jamaal Charles and Cassel as the least accomplished quarterback in the division.

Pile 15 turnovers on top of that and their 1-3 record may actually have been the best case scenario to this point.

Good to know: Dwayne Bowe is the Chiefs most explosive receiver, but Cassel’s desire to get him the ball all the time is making the Chiefs fairly predictable in the eyes of defensive coaches.

Bowe has been targeted 49 times this season by Cassel, more than twice that of any other Chiefs player — Dexter McCluster is next at 23.

The lowdown: The Raiders head into their bye week with severely bruised expectations, sitting at 1-3 with a run game that was expected to be a strength that is now 31st in the league with 243 yards.

And the only reason the Raiders aren’t last in the league is the Steelers, currently in 32nd with 195 yards, have only played three games.

The prospects, even with a little extra time to think things over, aren’t great after the week off either since the Raiders will return to work to face the Falcons, who are currently one of the league’s three 4-0 teams, with wins over the Chiefs, Broncos and Chargers already.

The Raiders favor the zone run scheme and that entails all five offensive linemen maintaining their discipline and not allow a gap for a defender to sneak through as they all fire out together to block areas rather than specific players. Oakland’s offensive front isn’t getting that done at the moment.

The Broncos consistently got up the field into those gaps and the Raiders didn’t keep things clear on the back-side of plays, to maintain the cut back options for the Raiders backs.

Running back Darren McFadden had his longest run of day — eight yards — on his second carry, he had 15 yards on his first three carries combined yet finished the day with just 34 yards rushing. The Raiders aren’t getting the interior players washed out of the play like the top-tier zone run teams do.

It’s all based on timing and movement, and it requires the offensive linemen to pick the “most dangerous” defender, in front of them at game speed no less. If they choose correctly, the offense moves against almost any defensive scheme, if they don’t, defenders overwhelm the point of attack.

It’s tough to fix in just one bye week, but it has to be near the top of Dennis Allen’s things-to-do list or the kind of punishment the Broncos dished out on Raiders quarterback Carson Palmer will only be repeated weekly because he will be in pass-first, catch-up mode much of the time.

Good to know: Raiders coach Dennis Allen has talked often that, with the league’s rule book tipped so far toward offenses, the only real way left to rattle quarterbacks is to rush them hard.

So, it has to be a little disconcerting for Allen the Raiders have just three sacks — 31st in the league — ahead of only the Jaguars’ two sacks.

The lowdown: It’s one thing if former first-round pick Ryan Mathews was hurt, but he wasn’t in Kansas City. It’s one thing if it was mop-up time, a run-out-the-clock scenario to get on the bus and go home.

But no, running back Jackie Battle started in front of Mathews this past weekend and took plenty of important snaps in the Chargers win over the Chiefs. And Battle could be looking at more of the same if Mathews doesn’t get the message.

Mathews’ fumbling issues appear to have him on the outside looking in a bit, despite his skill-set.

Battle finished with 15 carries in the game while Mathews had 14. And while Mathews was far more productive — 61 yards rushing to Battle’s 39 — consider the message being sent that to put the ball on the ground in crucial spots in crucial games, as Mathews did against Atlanta the week before, is not going to cut it.

While Chargers coach Norv Turner has publicly said he isn’t pushing Mathews to sit in the corner, it is clear Mathews got 10 of his 14 carries in the game in the fourth quarter when the Chargers had a three-touchdown lead.

In his previous five seasons in the NFL, Battle has had more than 32 carries just once — 149 carries and 597 yards rushing for the Chiefs last season after Charles had suffered a season-ending knee injury.

The Chiefs then deemed Battle expendable with Charles’ return and Kansas City’s signing on Peyton Hillis in free agency.

However, Battle has 163 yards rushing this season — on 5.1 yards per carry to go with three touchdowns while Hillis has 93 yards rushing this season and no touchdowns.

It is expected Mathews will climb to the top the depth chart again — he’s too talented and the Chargers find themselves in what figures to be a tight race with the Broncos for the AFC West lead — but it may come in increments in the coming weeks.

And if the ball leaves his hands, he may have to leave the lineup again.

Good to know: In Philip Rivers’ time at quarterback for the Chargers, the team has made a habit of roaring down the stretch, dominating November and December. If that’s the case again, the rest of the AFC may have some trouble brewing.

The Chargers are off to a 3-1 start for just the third time in Rivers’ tenure. The team started 4-1 last year before a six-game losing streak negated their 4-1 finish.

But the other 3-1 start, that turned into a 4-1 start was in 2006 — Rivers’ first year as a starter — when the Chargers eventually finished 14-2 for the first of four consecutive division titles.

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